First, to quote Fergie: I'm so 2008, you so two-thousand-and late. Just because saying that makes me feel hip. I'm kind of mailing it in this morning. Consider it a post-Bulls-loss hangover, mixed with me being depressed about getting blocked three times in a three game series of a two-on-two game last night. I just don't have the resiliency needed to bring it hard every day - I apologize. The cool thing is though, I'm going to do a sort of blogging "retweet" (Get Twitter, you'll understand), and go over what we're going to need out of the D-League before I head over to the bank and take out my $2 million to buy the Jam (I've had it stashed away in case I needed to dig into it after four months of odd jobs.) The fellas over at Golden State of Mind asked me "Let's say you get the ridiculous job of D-League Commissioner. What's the one thing you would change about or add to the D-League?" My answer was... drum roll please... actually, I'm not going to tell you. You'll have to check over there every twenty minutes until they're bored enough to post an interview with a D-League blogger. Anyway, this week I'll go over viable options that I didn't pick. First, we're going to look at some thoughts that are still über-relevant, via the Godfather of D-League blogging, Ridiculous Matt (Moore) (I miss him). Here's the first that he brought up (that I liked): Gotta Revamp The Assignment Rules: I understand you're dealing with one of the most powerful players' unions in pro sports. They want to protect the players and make sure they're not punished for contract disagreements by being assigned to the D-League. But there's too much potential being limited by the current rules, which only allow teams to assign a player that has zero or one year of service in the NBA. It restricts the ability of teams to effectively manage the progression of a player. I know the CBA is set and done and agreed upon, and the lawyers may not want to touch it. But seriously, NBA, lets look at it anyway. What's after the jump? My thoughts of course!
Good idea, Mr. Moore. The biggest reason I think the D-League should take another glance at this, when the next Collective Bargaining session happens of course, is that we, as D-League fans, aren't getting what we should from the NBA. I know, that sounds a bit self-absorbed, as the NBA has given us plenty: They've given us the D-League. However, I feel that there is so much more that the NBA could be doing for the D-League. If more people knew more about the D-League, more money would be made, meaning more money could go to player salaries, thus bolstering the D-League talent pool, as more players might stay in America, rather than head to Transylvania and Slovenia. Wait, why did I bring that up? Because the easiest way to make more people care about the D-League is by taking the NBA players they care about and putting them in the D-League - thus, we get back to assignments. Next season, Mo Almond, Kyrylo Fesenko, Ian Mahinmi, Sean Williams and Alando Tucker won't be assigned to the D-League, because they're supposedly already developed enough after spending limited time over the past two seasons in the D-League. Instead, they'll rot on an NBA bench. Sweet. Those players aren't exactly great examples, but that's only because players aren't assigned to the D-League regularly enough. Even if just every 14th and 15th man were able to be assigned to the D-League, along with the current rookies, the D-League would benefit. My solution? Let's make it mandatory, that if you're going to carry more than the 13 minimum players, you must assign at least two players, throughout the season, to the D-League. If they're not getting NBA minutes, they obviously need to develop some part of their game. You know where a great place would be to develop players? A place that focuses on Development. Hell, it'd be awesome if there was a league that had this in it's name. Wait. There is? The NBA Development League? But only players in their first or second NBA season are eligible? Everyone that's spent two seasons in the NBA is done developing? Dumb. D-Rizzle, call me. Let's go to work on this. We can build on this!!!!!!!
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